Long Cecil, Cannon at the Honoured Dead Memorial, Kimberley, South Africa

Long Cecil is an artillery piece displayed at the Honoured Dead Memorial in Kimberley, manufactured in De Beers mining workshops. The gun was roughly 10 feet long and made from a single billet of mild steel, shaped entirely on site.

Construction began on 26 December 1899, when De Beers workshops rough-turned the barrel from a 10-foot mild-steel billet meant for a machine shaft. The first proving shot was fired on 19 January 1900 at a Boer camp near Kamfers Dam. The gun fired 255 shells before the siege ended; within two weeks the Boers brought up a larger 100-pound Long Tom, and Major-General French's 8,000 cavalry relieved the city on 15 February 1900.

In 1902 Cecil Rhodes' coffin was carried through Cape Town on the Long Cecil's carriage during his funeral procession. The gun now stands on the stylobate of the Honoured Dead Memorial, facing the Free State, the direction from which the Boer guns had shelled Kimberley.

The gun stands on the stylobate of the Honoured Dead Memorial, its muzzle facing the Free State, the direction from which the Boer guns fired. The memorial sits at the top of Memorial Road; the surrounding ground is uneven, so sturdy shoes help.

The barrel began as a 10-foot (3 m) billet of mild steel ordered as a shaft for a De Beers workshop machine. The first proving shot was fired at a Boer camp near Kamfers Dam on 19 January 1900, less than four weeks after work started on 26 December 1899.